Tagged Questions

I'm interested in learning the Italian system for the ta'amei hamikra, either for Torah and/or Haftarah (preference to Haftarah as the Italian melodies are very beautiful). This website has tons of ...

Rambam, Hilchot Tefilah 12:11 talks about the מתורגמן, a translator who would translate the Torah into Aramaic during the reading. He says that neither the reader nor the translator may be louder than ...

It's time for Kri'at Hatorah (public Torah reading) on a Monday. The shul's regular Ba'al Kri'ah is absent, and no one else in the shul can read from the Torah - not even the rabbi. It is not just a ...

If someone (me) is going over the leining, is it OK to say "amen" before the aliyah, as is done during the real reading?
I've heard the concept of אמן יתומה - an "orphaned" amen, but understood that ...

In Teimani and Kurdish batei knesset, the minhag is, as far as I'm aware, to read a targum after each pasuk. Assuming that a schul wishes to adopt the kriat hatargum, would it be acceptable to adopt a ...

I'm working with a student for his bar mitzvah whose family is Yemenite in origin, but has no living relatives who remember much of their tradition. He is interested in learning to leyn with Yemenite ...

I understand that we are not supposed to learn Torah, in general from afternoon of Erev Tish'a B'av until after chatzot of Tish'a B'av except for designated areas such as Eicha, Iyov, etc.
Does this ...

In some shuls that I have attended, they end the Cohen aliyah of Shabbat parshat Devarim one pasuk before the one where "Sheni" is marked (i.e. - they end it before pasuk 11 instead of 12).
I'm not ...

Is there a machine-readable Sefer Torah or Chumash? Machine-readable meaning formatted as to be understood by a computer program. Despite the phrase, this is different from a Torah simply stored in ...

I have read from many different Sifrei Torah as a Ba'al Kri'ah during the past approx. 30 years. Each Torah is unique, as B"H, it should be. Every sofer has a slightly different writing style, even ...

As far as I can remember, during the course of the year there are eight sets of parshiyot that are sometimes joined together:
תרומה תצווה
ויקהל פקודי
תזריע מצורע
אחרי מות קדושים
בהר בחקותי
חוקת בלק
...

Could someone point me to the source of the custom where typically within the Sephardic communities, it is customary for a boy to be called for maftir/hafatarah at the age of 9 years.
Is this brought ...

I've heard that, when receiving the last aliyah in a particular sefer, the oleh (one who received the aliyah) should not say “chazak, chazak…” because it is a berachah given to him by the congregation ...

Instead of a yad (finger pointer), can someone use a laser pointer to help him follow the place as he reads the Torah during public Torah reading? I can't imagine that there are any halachic issues, ...

I am a Ba'al Kri'ah. I am quite confused regarding the rules of "kamatz katan". Another Ba'al Kri'ah explained that a kamatz katan occurs when a kamatz is used in a word (usually a verb) when the root ...

Ezra declared that the curses in Vayikra be read before Shavuos and those in Devarim before Rosh HaShanna (megillah 31b), how was that accomplished by those in Eretz Yisrael who had a triennial system ...

We would like to perform a minyan for the deaf. All the participants can speak verbally, but cannot hear, including the Torah reader. Can he sign the words that he is reading during Kri'at Hatorah, or ...

If someone didn't hear words (or perhaps even an entire verse) from Parshas Zachor or Parshas Parah, are they yotzee b'dieved? I'm specifically asking in this case since Parshas Zachor is d'oraisa and ...

I understand that one is supposed to follow along with the communal Torah reading in Hebrew. But is this actually a requirement, as opposed to just a good thing to do? Another way of asking the same ...

In four places in Tanakh, our text has an aleph with a dagesh: Gen 43:26, Lev 23:17, Job 33:21, and Ezra 8:18. What is the significance of this, and for the first two examples, how would you indicate ...

It takes me forever to prepare laining (i.e. to memorize the trop).
Does anyone know of an algorithm, whether brought down anywhere or not, of how to prepare quickly and efficiently?
I.e. just read ...

I'm tracking down the "triennial pericopes" (sidrot) from the introduction to Ginsburg's massorah, also listed in the Jewish Encyclopedia, and thus I have the beginning and ending verses, but I'd like ...

The Shulchan Aruch (OC 139:4) discusses the potential issue that a listener might think that the blessings for an aliya are actually written in the Torah scroll. Different suggestions are offered for ...

I have heard that a haftorah klaf (scroll) is still considered kosher and usable if the Ta'amei Mikra have been written on it. Yet I've always been told that this is not true for a Torah scroll. Why ...

Someone reading from the Torah gets the singing note (trop) wrong for one of the names of Hashem, in a manner which changes the meaning of the verse. He then needs to go back and repeat the name of ...

If someone who usually pronounces the letter "ת" without a dagesh as "sav" is leining Torah, and he accidentally says "tav" in a place where he would normally say "sav", should the gabbai correct him? ...